This invention relates to apparatus for coating articles of essentially cylindrical or round shape, such as beverage bottles and cans, with any desired substance. The invention is directed more specifically to such apparatus suitable for creating one or more band-shaped coatings of paints, pastes, or other substances around the body of each of beverage bottles being fed in succession along a predetermined path.
Beverage bottles have heretofore been coated with paints, pastes or the like by dropping the coating substance on the bottles, by dipping the bottles in the coating substance, or by spraying. An objection to such conventional practices is their incompatibility with other bottling-line operations, because they require the bottles to be at a temporary standstill while being coated. The advent of apparatus has long been awaited which is capable of painting or otherwise coating a succession of beverage bottles being fed along a bottling line, without arresting their travel.
The coating of beverage bottles is also required for protection of their surfaces. Of the various parts of a typical beverage bottle, the body, shoulder, and bottom end portions are most liable to develop scratches and other surface imperfections. Protective coatings may therefore be applied only to such vulnerable surface portions of the bottle, rather than to its entire surfaces. Another application of this invention is the coating of bottles with a paste for labeling. In this application, too, the coating of only a part or parts of each bottle body usually suffices.